


Who needs an Animus?

by Tafferling



Category: A Shielding Thing, Assassin's Creed - All Media Types, Dying Light
Genre: /r/FanFiction Challenge, Gen, Guest Star: Chris Redfield, Pirates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-29
Updated: 2017-05-29
Packaged: 2018-11-06 08:34:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11032536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tafferling/pseuds/Tafferling
Summary: Pirates. Assassins. A swashbuckling adventure in the gorgeous caribbean, plucked right out of one of Kyle Crane's favourite video game franchises. And he doesn't even need an Animus to get there (which he's grateful for, because he'd always thought those bits were boring). No, he's got better: Sadja Shielding, the reluctant Keeper who's off to play fetch. A game best played in pairs, so enter player 2 andOh man, pirates!





	Who needs an Animus?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Precursor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Precursor/gifts).



> Written for the [/r/FanFiction May Challenge. ](https://www.reddit.com/r/FanFiction/comments/6dzdyc/prompts_challenge_round_12_post/) But mostly for [Precursor](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Precursor) ;)
> 
> This will make absolutely no sense to anyone but me. Which is fine. I love it. I love my Pirate!Crane and I want more of him.

" **I** _ love  _ pirates," Crane says. Again. Claps his hands together in front of him, and breaks a toothy grin her way. 

"You've mentioned." Sadja looks at him, measures him from the soles of his boots— high ones that fold at the top over thick linen trousers —and all the way up to that  _ ridiculous  _ hat. "Frequently mentioned. Say, sashes? What's with the sashes? And that shirt? It's atrocious _. _ "

"Hey, I'm trying to blend in. Unlike you. Come on, where are the frills? You need puffy cuffs and—" His hand dives for her chest, a long finger hooked and ready to tug her shirt down, because sometimes the man has about as much spark of wit in him as two rocks knocked together. Wet rocks. She clicks her tongue. The finger pauses an inch from the hem. Wiggles in a menacing sort of way. "—bodice. You need a bodice."   

She shakes her head, and throws a look at their quiet observer leaning by the patch of wall he's claimed for himself. Redfield's brow slants lazily when their eyes meet. 

"He's going to get himself killed," she tells him. "This is a horrible idea."

"Heey—" Crane complains and puffs out his chest in protest.  

Redfield shrugs with a noncommittal shift of his shoulders, and taps the cane he's got against the fresh cast on his leg.  _ Tap-Tap _ "Not my problem this time."

"I can do this on my own," her argument goes, and they go through the motions. Have been down that road before, and are likely to hike it many a time more. There's a scoff from him, and a shake of his head, and this time he doesn't even bother with the  _ No fucking way.  _ Just lifts the cane and jabs it at the air, right past her, and right at  _ work  _ still waiting for her to get to it.  

Sadja sighs, flicks her eyes to the Cataract suspended above the ground in the centre of the cavern. It ripples with impatience.  _ What are you waiting for?  _ Winks back at her with brilliant turquoise against the backdrop of old, dark rock, and calls for her with the scent of sun kissed salt. Teases her with the mumble of waves rippling past her ankles, a riptide drawing her in close.

"Fine," she says. "It'll be his funeral though. I'm telling you, if I come back alone, you're not blaming me. And, Crane— " She catches him with the flat of her hand against his chest when he eagerly marches for the Cataract. "—I hear you  _ HarrHarr  _ one more time, I'll find a boat, and I'll find a plank, and walk you off it myself."

* * *

" **B** ut pirates _. _ " Kyle pouts. "Pirate  _ assassins,  _ how cool is that?" 

Sadja rewards him with a brief smirk, quick enough to barely register, before she gives him a gentle shove. He walks with the pressure. Back-back-back, and shoots a look over his shoulder; at the Cataract sitting in the air. His stomach twists a little. His spine runs a little cold. And yes, Kyle is nervous. Who wouldn't be when you're about to step through worlds/realities/dimensions/fucked-if-I-know-what-they're-called and expect yourself to come out in one piece on the other end. Or maybe it's more like falling. Or Leaping. Floating. Or none or all— he  _ really  _ doesn't know. Just sees the thing come closer, a sheet of liquid that isn't liquid. Isn't wet, but also isn't dry, and he still thinks it looks like the ocean's surface from the bottom of a reef. Like a wave about to sweep him up. Which he should know all about, since he's tried surfing and was absolute shit at it, spending most of his time trying to break his neck under the waves, rather than on.

"Crane." Across the room, Redfield nods to Sadja with a subtle motion of his chin. "Look after her." 

It's not a question. Not a request. More like an order. Kyle smirks. 

"Sir. Yessir. With pleasure, sir." He lays it on real thick with a sloppy, two fingered salute, right when Sadja pushes him. Nudged off balance, Kyle lurches sideways, twists awkwardly and trips. The Cataract catches him. Its turquoise surface sheds clouds of particles. Like dust or shredded fireflies with a mind of their own. Hundreds. Thousands. They settle around him. Cold. Hot. Neither. And then a current rips through him, rings his bones like wind chimes. For a while, he's done breathing. His heart thumps once. Thumps twice. 

Stills.

And maybe that's what dying feels like. A crushing sort of weightlessness that shatters him and leaves him scattered like sand dragged into the ocean

Sand.  _ Sand.  _ His heart kicks, turns over in his chest like an engine ready to drive him back out into the light, and there's sand. Everywhere. In particular, there's sand in his fucking mouth. Kyle chokes. Spits. Tells the grainy shit between his lips and bunched up between his fingers to fuck off, and rolls onto his back.

Heat lays across his face, and when he squints, the rock cavern he's just been in a few seconds ago is gone. Instead, he finds painfully bright blue skies and a high hanging sun beating down at him. And Sadja. She blocks out the glare, all cheeky smirk and auburn hair curling around lightly freckled cheeks.  

"Hi," he says. Her head cocks left. Or maybe right, things are still a little out of whack, his compass spinning uselessly. "How'd I do?"

"Marginally better than last time."

Kyle puts effort into a rueful smile, and she puts her back into getting him on his feet, one wobbly step at a time, until he thinks he can tell apart what's up and what's down, and sparks stop dancing in the corner of his eyes. 

He shakes the sand from his clothes, scrapes fingers down his jaw to get the grains out of his beard, and take a deep breath. The air goes down nice. Spicy and crisp and pure, without the lingering flavour of humanity stuck to it. It's… great. Feels a little like sticking his head out a tent way up a mountainside in some thick jungle somewhere, far off from anyone and anything. Except not quite, and that bit of skewed perception tickles at him. 

Kyle rolls his shoulders, leans his head back, and casts a look around. More sand. Almost perfectly white where it's nuzzled up against an impeccable, turquoise sheet of water. A wide bay stretches out left and right, with thick, lush green pressed in from the land to meet the beach. 

For a second, he thinks of Harran. The beaches there had been pretty too. Damn pretty, and damn near perfect. But not just  _ as  _ perfect and not just as clean. Definitely not as clean, what with civilisation crouched over them and leaving its shitty footprints all over the place. Harran had been a lot of things, neat hadn't been one of them. He kicks at the sand. No trash. No parasols. No cabana chairs. Just  _ sand _ and water and— 

"Ship!" His arm comes up and he points across the ocean to the massive vessel bobbing gently in the distance. "Probably a galleon— look, it's got two decks and—" He counted with his finger twitching. "—one, two, three,  _ four  _ masts. This thing is huge! There's a row of canno—" 

"Mh. Very exciting, Crane." Her arm hooks into his. "I have work to do though, and not much time to do it. So how about we get to it, mh?"

"But ship," he whines, though they're already trudging through the loose sand and headed for the thick jungle ready to wrap them in green shade.

* * *

**W** ork, as it turnes out, takes longer than expected. It's day four, with no end in sight, and Crane spends every waking moment with his soul aflutter. He's alert and he's attentive. Follows where he's got to.  Leads when the moment calls for it— but not once loses the bewildered glee that reminds her of a child born to grayscale that only now had a world full of colour shown to it. He's a delight like that. So when he  _ HarrHarr's  _ at her after the sun has set after their second day, and they're wrestling for real estate in a rickety, cramped shack for the night, she lets it slide. They're both tired anyway.

And then he mucks it up. Because whyever wouldn't he? 

She doesn't know how. She doesn't know why. Maybe he let his mouth run when he shouldn't have. Or  _ HarrHarr'ed  _ himself into trouble while she's got her back turned to him. Not like it matters a great deal (and okay, maybe it wasn't his fault).

They've followed a trail of unhelpful clues into a dingy tavern that's bursting at the seams at this hour of the night. In here, the air is thick with smoke and sweat, and torches set in the walls cast a mess of shadows between the corners. And its noisy. Deafening. Laughter and singing and souls so merry they don't care a lick as she prowls in their midst looking for that spark of  _ different _ . She finds it, though so does Crane, drawn to it like a moth to the flame. Which, to be perfectly honest, doesn't tend to end well for the moth even at the best of nights. There's a thing about open fire and fragile wings. Something quick and violent that leaves no more than ash. 

But Crane insists  _ he's got this,  _ and for a little while maybe he does. He's leaning with his hip propped against the bar counter, a whole lot of  _ Hi, what's up?  _ in how he's angled towards the fiery headed woman in front of him. She's that bit of peculiar standing out from the din of souls, a presence carved from something hard and weathered. 

Then Sadja feels it: the ill intent, the sour taste at the back of her mouth as a badly mannered soul lashes out. It's a ripple effect, that. Leaps from man to woman and woman to man, and yes, maybe it's not even Crane's fault when a thick limbed, wide waisted brute takes a swing at him. 

_ Shit— _

There's a taut pull against her navel and her heartbeat kicks up. Bounds right along his as Crane avoids the swing with a shift of his weight. The brute swings again. Misses again. Roars and lurches forward. Meat and muscle and tanned skin all barreling for a thoroughly perplexed Crane. 

No. Not perplexed. Sadja sighs. He's amused.  _ Thrilled.  _ (And so maybe that's a little catching too, but she's not about to admit that yet.) The brute gets his arm locked— and  _ POP  _ his nose goes. Crane is hard headed. Likes to make sure the world knows. Behind him, two patrons peel away from the bar. Close in on him, and Sadja notes the shift in the room. Groups breaking up. Tables bumping as people scurry out from under them. And the bit of  _ peculiar  _ remains where she is, an elbow propped on the bar, and a long, elegant brow arched at the scuffle. 

Crane has himself grabbed in a bear hug from behind. And that's about as efficient as asking him nicely to stand still while he's having himself punched. The man— with a hat equally ridiculous as Crane's —ends on his back a beat later, a lot of Crane landing on top of him. One snap of the elbow between his leg, and then a box to his throat on the way up, and that's one out of commission. By now, Crane lost his hat at least. An improvement, she thinks, as she squeezes past a patron trying to get away from the fight.

The original thug charges again. He's got blood down his front and murder in his eyes. She kicks a chair into his path. It spins across the hardwood floor, and the bloody thug catches it with his legs. He goes down with a loud thump.

And since she's announced herself, some attention flicks her way. It bounds up to her with terrible glee, followed by a man in striped linen and with baggy trousers a bit soggy from seawater or booze. Sadja lets him come. Gives him a bit of ground. Snatches his arm, and with a hard pivot on the balls of her feet, cracks her elbow into his throat. He fall aways, wheezing— her eyes flick up, catch the glint of steel. Behind Crane, no way for him to see.

So she sends a notions his way. An idea that he ought to stop taunting the man in front of him, and turn to catch the arm with the blade. A couple months ago, he'd have hesitated, now he spins and the man's wrist gets pinched between his. They dance a little after that— around and around and around— until they hit the bar counter and turn a few more times trying to settle who's about to stab who. Crane ends up with his back to it, the knife still having a try for his throat, and the dance stops barely half an arm's width from the fiery headed woman. 

She gives her bottle of liquor a lazy nudge. Puts it right where Crane can grab for it. His thanks are a strained grin past the knife and bearded snarl leaning into him, and a quick snatch for the bottle's neck. It cracks against a skull hard enough to shatter it to pieces—

—and by the time they're bolting from the tavern with the sound of exploding gunpowder chasing them, they've broken quite a bit more. Every corner they whip around is a burst of wood or plaster, and every whoop from Crane brings angry bellows at their heels. 

"I'm going to murder you," she tells him at one point, with a boot on his interlaced fingers and a hand on his shoulder as he pushes her up over a tall wall made of brittle brick and mud. 

"Hey, this isn't my fault," he grunts at her. She slips over the wall's crest, and he hits the bottom on the other side a beat later. "But we are being chased by  _ pirates— _ " He dusts himself off. Grabs her wrist and hurries her along. "How fucking cool is that?"


End file.
